Hacker News: nickburns

New comment by nickburns in "Wikipedia cofounder Larry Sanger blocked from editing Wikipedia"

nickburns — Wed, 24 Jun 2026 02:07:28 +0000

Larry Sanger once called me "butthurt" just before welcoming me to his e-mail "killfile". I forget the context completely, but to this day it stands as one of my proudest young Internet troll moments.

New comment by nickburns in "Claude Desktop spawns 1.8 GB Hyper-V VM on every launch, even for chat-only use"

nickburns — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 19:27:22 +0000

You're right, it's not ambiguous. It's literally incorrect.

New comment by nickburns in "Claude Desktop spawns 1.8 GB Hyper-V VM on every launch, even for chat-only use"

nickburns — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 19:26:45 +0000

Yeah, no.

New comment by nickburns in "Mornings and nights no longer exist at 47C: A day in the hottest place in India"

nickburns — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 23:53:50 +0000

> But what made this summer's episode unusual was its persistence.

But, but—it's not summer in the Nothern Hemisphere yet.

New comment by nickburns in "IPv6 zones in URLs are a mistake"

nickburns — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 23:47:32 +0000

If it ain't broke!

New comment by nickburns in "IPv6 zones in URLs are a mistake"

nickburns — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 23:42:58 +0000

More strange. Stranger. This is strange. Stranger? Who are you?

New comment by nickburns in "The desperation of NYTimes"

nickburns — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 19:50:06 +0000

So subscribing to NYT somehow changed your stance on online privacy? Color me confused...

New comment by nickburns in "AI outperforms law professors in Stanford Law study"

nickburns — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 14:19:25 +0000

Ah, great! I 'took a shot in the dark' there. Glad it 'panned out'. ;)

New comment by nickburns in "AI outperforms law professors in Stanford Law study"

nickburns — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 13:15:02 +0000

'Bread *and butter'. The English expression requires the second part—but otherwise fits perfectly in your well-stated point, with which I wholeheartedly agree.

Source: AAL.

New comment by nickburns in "What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications"

nickburns — Thu, 28 May 2026 00:15:31 +0000

TFA discusses at-length how APNs and FCM are necessary intermediaries regardless, effectively creating a technical duopoly on 'push'. We all agree it would've been preferable for things not to have gotten this way, but here we are.

New comment by nickburns in "What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications"

nickburns — Wed, 27 May 2026 22:06:32 +0000

> You think there might be some sort of interaction between both facets there?

With the exception of one trying to extract currency from the other, in exchange for something of dubious value—no.

New comment by nickburns in "SpaceX S-1"

nickburns — Thu, 21 May 2026 21:04:56 +0000

But, but—convection!

New comment by nickburns in "Get your passwords out of Bitwarden while you still can"

nickburns — Thu, 21 May 2026 16:21:58 +0000

Anyone not already using KeePass (or KeePassXC) has been doing it wrong for at least a decade.

KeePass2Android Offline and KeePassium on mobile.

New comment by nickburns in "SpaceX S-1"

nickburns — Thu, 21 May 2026 14:14:27 +0000

[flagged]

New comment by nickburns in "SpaceX S-1"

nickburns — Thu, 21 May 2026 03:46:24 +0000

This thread contains a significantly higher concentration of dumb than the typical front page post. Gee, I wonder why.

New comment by nickburns in "SpaceX S-1"

nickburns — Thu, 21 May 2026 03:43:16 +0000

You know 'space' is a vacuum, right?

New comment by nickburns in "560-610 minutes of exercise a week needed for substantial heart benefits"

nickburns — Wed, 20 May 2026 17:51:42 +0000

> Does lifting weights count as vigorous though?

In my own experience, no. Strictly cardio. The number of squats you'd have to do to constitue even five minutes of vigorous activity is practicably impossible.

Lifting weights could certainly count/classify as moderate activity though, just without as much 'bang for your buck' as dedicated aerobic exercise.

New comment by nickburns in "560-610 minutes of exercise a week needed for substantial heart benefits"

nickburns — Wed, 20 May 2026 17:48:27 +0000

Calling it 'the gym' sort of conflates its two distinct sections: the one containing cardio equipment, and the other containing strength training/bodybuilding equipment. So-called 'work capacity' aside, there's almost zero overlap between the two sections.

Whether someone's effectively strength training/bodybuilding or not, which is the section I think you refer to—nobody reasonably believes that does anything significant for cardiovascular health, which is the topic being dicussed here.

New comment by nickburns in "560-610 minutes of exercise a week needed for substantial heart benefits"

nickburns — Wed, 20 May 2026 14:29:45 +0000

Consider the speed/vigor with which one does something, whatever it might be. It can be quite the range.

New comment by nickburns in "560-610 minutes of exercise a week needed for substantial heart benefits"

nickburns — Wed, 20 May 2026 14:25:26 +0000

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_equivalent_of_task